I visited Pyuthan recently. Where is that? See here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyuthan_District. Five hours drive north of Butwal on dusty roads brings you to a very beautiful valley. It is spring now so the wide valley floors are completely green and visually very appealing.
This woman is a Magar. I liked her nose-ring.
View On Black
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Magar woman from Pyuthan
Sunday, February 21, 2010
(Trekking) Map of Nepal: It's kind of interactive and good quality
This is the best map of Nepal on the entire Internet. Well Google maps is there but currently there is very little information about place names or trails on that. This maps gives an excellent overview of the mountain geography of the country. The map has been made by Himalaya Map House to show the Great Himalaya Trail route as proposed by Robin Boustead. See http://www.thegreathimalayatrail.org/ for more about the long distance path, or long distance trail which extends across the Nepal Himalaya.
Anyway, enjoy the map. Click below and give a few seconds for it to load.
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Nepali coffee and how to prepare it
I've just imported some espresso coffee making things from China. I still don't really know what to call them. I say "Coffee pot" but they also go by macchinetta, caffettiera or moka pot. I heard that every home in Italy has one of these in its kitchen, though some of these will now be packed away now that electric espresso machines have become so affordable. Still, such a coffee pot is probably the cheapest, simplest way to make good coffee at home. If more people can make good coffee at home, won't the home market grow just a little bit more benefiting farmers in rural Nepal? So this is the attempt to add a little caffeine boost to the wider public in Kathmandu and beyond.
This mission started in Langtang after 10 days of Nescafé in a country with some pretty good coffee being produced. In these trekking areas all lodges have to have fixed menus and fixed prices set by the local tourism committee. While it stifles culinary-creativity somewhat, it stops price wars and thus tries to focus the lodge owners minds on keeping the lodge looking tidy and its bedrooms clean.
Still, with competition rampant, it was hard for lodges or tea-shops to differentiate themselves from the next one along the path, or rather, the one big fancy one that all the guides assumed their clients would want to go to. Perhaps a bit of real, freshly prepared coffee would be enough to attract people to a smaller, less conspicuous (and less successful) lodge?
This has not been proven yet as it took around 8 months from placing the order to getting them to Kathmandu. In the coming months, some good Nepali coffee should make its way up to Langtang. Let's see how the tourists like it.
http://coffeepotnepal.com/
This mission started in Langtang after 10 days of Nescafé in a country with some pretty good coffee being produced. In these trekking areas all lodges have to have fixed menus and fixed prices set by the local tourism committee. While it stifles culinary-creativity somewhat, it stops price wars and thus tries to focus the lodge owners minds on keeping the lodge looking tidy and its bedrooms clean.
Still, with competition rampant, it was hard for lodges or tea-shops to differentiate themselves from the next one along the path, or rather, the one big fancy one that all the guides assumed their clients would want to go to. Perhaps a bit of real, freshly prepared coffee would be enough to attract people to a smaller, less conspicuous (and less successful) lodge?
This has not been proven yet as it took around 8 months from placing the order to getting them to Kathmandu. In the coming months, some good Nepali coffee should make its way up to Langtang. Let's see how the tourists like it.
Ok, I'll bite - Make Money Blogging Free eBook review
A week or two ago, I visited Gulmarg in Kashmir to snowboard. A few days before arriving, there was an unusually big storm which left somewhere between one and two meters of snow lying around. And naturally some of it wouldn't stay put and, in one particular case, a huge and record-book making avalanche hit an army camp sadly killing 18 servicemen.
While everybody's concern was with the victims and those being rescued, at the same time, people were desperately waiting for the gondola (the longest in the world no less) to open so that they could head up onto those dangerously avalanche prone slopes. This is how people are of course.
Gulmarg, like any ski-resort, has a snow patrol that monitor the safety of the slopes. It is headed by Brian, from New Zealand. On several occasions he came out to address the waiting crowds before the gondola station. Dressed in tighter-that-usual, all-black ski gear, with neatly cropped ginger facial hair and aviator specs, he cut a dashing figure and thus commanded great authority. As a consequence, no-one seemed to mind too much when he gave the bad news, that, for the time being, the slopes would remain closed.
To move on to the point of this blog entry, he ran a blog on snow safety (which has a fantastic header image) which you can check here: http://www.gulmargsnowsafety.com/. It looked like a nice simple site and I thought the template might be worth using again some time. At the footer, the origin of the template used is always shown. In this case: http://www.dailyblogtips.com/wordpress-themes/. To get the themes you have to sign up to the newsletter which seemed like a worthwhile exchange.
As part of this exchange, I got a free copy of "Make Money Blogging Free eBook" which I read. I blog, so could I ever make money from it? If you own or manage a website then I recommend that you get a copy of it here:
http://www.dailyblogtips.com/make-money-blogging/
I don't think I will ever make money blogging, I'd still like more people to read what I write however. For that to happen, I need to do a few things differently. One is to write more often, and be useful, unique while I'm at it. Importantly I need people to link to this site, and I need to link to those who link to me. These are some of the simpler things I learned from the eBook, and this is why I am writing this post. My quote: "It's changed the way I blog"
While everybody's concern was with the victims and those being rescued, at the same time, people were desperately waiting for the gondola (the longest in the world no less) to open so that they could head up onto those dangerously avalanche prone slopes. This is how people are of course.
Gulmarg, like any ski-resort, has a snow patrol that monitor the safety of the slopes. It is headed by Brian, from New Zealand. On several occasions he came out to address the waiting crowds before the gondola station. Dressed in tighter-that-usual, all-black ski gear, with neatly cropped ginger facial hair and aviator specs, he cut a dashing figure and thus commanded great authority. As a consequence, no-one seemed to mind too much when he gave the bad news, that, for the time being, the slopes would remain closed.
To move on to the point of this blog entry, he ran a blog on snow safety (which has a fantastic header image) which you can check here: http://www.gulmargsnowsafety.com/. It looked like a nice simple site and I thought the template might be worth using again some time. At the footer, the origin of the template used is always shown. In this case: http://www.dailyblogtips.com/wordpress-themes/. To get the themes you have to sign up to the newsletter which seemed like a worthwhile exchange.
As part of this exchange, I got a free copy of "Make Money Blogging Free eBook" which I read. I blog, so could I ever make money from it? If you own or manage a website then I recommend that you get a copy of it here:
http://www.dailyblogtips.com/make-money-blogging/
I don't think I will ever make money blogging, I'd still like more people to read what I write however. For that to happen, I need to do a few things differently. One is to write more often, and be useful, unique while I'm at it. Importantly I need people to link to this site, and I need to link to those who link to me. These are some of the simpler things I learned from the eBook, and this is why I am writing this post. My quote: "It's changed the way I blog"
Saturday, January 09, 2010
Transparency and technology and Nepal
I have little idea what politicians do here in Nepal. I read mainly negative things about them, perhaps due to the fact that the press report mainly negative things: a slap of a civil servant here, an attack on a doctor there, a trip to a hospital in Singapore for treatment at the tax payer's expense; a bit (or a lot) of nepotism and obviously some corruption (because its a perk of the job).
But then if the subject of politicians is raised in conversation, reactions range from frustration to rage. Their reputation among the public (that I speak to) is poor. There is a little praise reserved for a couple of young hopes: Gagan Thapa is one who is often mentioned.
Nawaraj Silwal, Siddhartha Rana, Ashmi Rana, Ashutosh Tiwari, Santosh Shah
I attended a conference around a month ago. It was hastily organised apparently, the audience was stuffed with students from one of the speaker's hospitality college. The questions from the youth audience were limited and required to be 'brief and to the point' while the speakers were allowed to waffle on, off the point.
With one bright exception (though I missed the first speaker). One of the speakers there was Santosh Shah. He is well known in Nepal for his Today's Youth Asia initiative which comprises of a TV show, magazine run by youth and an education program which has trained hundreds of teenagers in personal development. The theme of his talk was institutions. His argument was that a) institutions are important, obviously, but b) that no individual should be, or think themselves bigger than an institution.
And this is the case with many Nepali politicians, some seem to believe themselves to be bigger than the institution that they work for.
As someone with a background in web development, one organisation I admire is MySociety. One of their collection of websites, it called 'They work for you'.
Essentially it aggregates information about MPs in the UK using some clever technology which 'scrapes' published documents, such as Hansard, and collates information in an accessible way.
I have seen the fruits of this on several occasions where a journalist has asked a question of an MP who's answer is flatly contradicted by the evidence available on the site. It's powerful.
Could something like this work and benefit the public and journalists in Nepal? Possibly, but it would be quite different. The main reason would be that information could not be collated automatically.
But perhaps something could be done as a collaboration between journalists. If journalists reporting on politics and events could post information on a site and categorise it simply, perhaps a public picture can be built up of that politician. Logging where they go, their public comments and public promises, the slaps, the assaults and the gaffs should be easy. Assimilating information on their performance, how they vote, how often they turn up to work, their expenses and outside business interests would be a little more difficult. Perhaps the website would encourage whistle-blowers to bring new information to the table. Perhaps some kind of scoring system could rank their performance and distinguish the wheat from the chaff. Possibly it would be difficult to keep the postings impartial, but not impossible, and who would manage that?
Any thoughts on this anyone?
But then if the subject of politicians is raised in conversation, reactions range from frustration to rage. Their reputation among the public (that I speak to) is poor. There is a little praise reserved for a couple of young hopes: Gagan Thapa is one who is often mentioned.
I attended a conference around a month ago. It was hastily organised apparently, the audience was stuffed with students from one of the speaker's hospitality college. The questions from the youth audience were limited and required to be 'brief and to the point' while the speakers were allowed to waffle on, off the point.
With one bright exception (though I missed the first speaker). One of the speakers there was Santosh Shah. He is well known in Nepal for his Today's Youth Asia initiative which comprises of a TV show, magazine run by youth and an education program which has trained hundreds of teenagers in personal development. The theme of his talk was institutions. His argument was that a) institutions are important, obviously, but b) that no individual should be, or think themselves bigger than an institution.
And this is the case with many Nepali politicians, some seem to believe themselves to be bigger than the institution that they work for.
As someone with a background in web development, one organisation I admire is MySociety. One of their collection of websites, it called 'They work for you'.
Essentially it aggregates information about MPs in the UK using some clever technology which 'scrapes' published documents, such as Hansard, and collates information in an accessible way.
I have seen the fruits of this on several occasions where a journalist has asked a question of an MP who's answer is flatly contradicted by the evidence available on the site. It's powerful.
Could something like this work and benefit the public and journalists in Nepal? Possibly, but it would be quite different. The main reason would be that information could not be collated automatically.
But perhaps something could be done as a collaboration between journalists. If journalists reporting on politics and events could post information on a site and categorise it simply, perhaps a public picture can be built up of that politician. Logging where they go, their public comments and public promises, the slaps, the assaults and the gaffs should be easy. Assimilating information on their performance, how they vote, how often they turn up to work, their expenses and outside business interests would be a little more difficult. Perhaps the website would encourage whistle-blowers to bring new information to the table. Perhaps some kind of scoring system could rank their performance and distinguish the wheat from the chaff. Possibly it would be difficult to keep the postings impartial, but not impossible, and who would manage that?
Any thoughts on this anyone?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
